Seth Rogen has one response for those posting ‘all lives matter’

After posting on Instagram in support of the Black Lives Matter movement, Seth Rogen pulled no punches when responding to fans who replied that “all lives matter.”

On Tuesday, Rogen posted a stark graphic emblazoned with the movement’s name and captioned “If this is a remotely controversial statement to you, feel free to unfollow me.” The post drew over 100,000 comments, many saying that “all lives matter,” a slogan that many argue silences activists and minimizes America’s history of systemic racism.

But Rogen faced criticism for his own activism over the weekend when he “matched” a $50 donation to a bail fund for protesters and publicized the gift on Twitter. Some fans argued that a celebrity with a net worth of $55 million could and should have donated much more.

Lea Michele apologizes for ‘traumatic microaggressions’

Lea Michele apologized publicly after a former “Glee” co-star, Samantha Ware, accused her of racist behavior on set.

Trouble began when Michele condemned police violence after George Floyd’s death. “This is not an isolated incident and it must end,” she tweeted on Friday, expressing support for the Black Lives Matter Movement.

On Monday Ware, who filmed 11 “Glee” episodes with Michele, clapped back, calling her a hypocrite and saying that she had made her time on the show a “living hell.”

“I believe you told everyone that if you had the opportunity you would s*** in my wig! Amongst other traumatic microaggressions that made me question a career in Hollywood,” Ware wrote.

LMAO REMEMBER WHEN YOU MADE MY FIRST TELEVISON GIG A LIVING HELL?!?! CAUSE ILL NEVER FORGET. I BELIEVE YOU TOLD EVERYONE THAT IF TOU HAD THE OPPORTUNITY YOU WOULD “SHIT IN MY WIG!” AMONGST OTHER TRAUMATIC MICROAGRESSIONS THAT MADE ME QUESTION A CAREER IN HOLLYWOOD… https://t.co/RkcaMBmtDA— SAMEYAAAAAA (@Sammie_Ware) June 2, 2020

Several of Michele’s African American co-stars commented in support of Ware and recalled similar experiences. “I felt every one of those capital letters,” tweeted Yvette Nicole Brown, who worked with the Glee star on The Mayor. Actor Dabier, who guest-starred on “Glee,” said that Michele didn’t let him sit next to other cast members because he didn’t “belong there.”

In the wake of Floyd’s killing, public figures have been called out for virtue signaling without actually using their platforms to advance racial justice. Fans criticized several affluent figures, including Seth Rogen and Beanie Feldstein, for publicizing relatively paltry donations to bail funds on social media (both Rogen and Feldstein later said that they’d given more privately).

But Michele may be the first to face the backlash where, for celebrities, it really hurts — in brand partnerships. Meal delivery company Hello Fresh dropped Michele as a sponsor after the incident, saying in a statement that the company “does not condone racism or discrimination of any kind.”

On Tuesday, Michele posted a lengthy semi-apology on Instagram. While she said that she did not remember making comments about Ware’s wig and insisted she had “never judged others by their background or color of their skin,” she said the past few weeks have showed her she needs to “take the time to listen and learn about other people’s perspectives.”

Just over a month after tearfully apologizing for her last coronavirus-era transgressions, beleaguered influencer Arielle Charnas is making headlines again — this time for stiffing her florist.

Owner of the clothing line Something Navy, Charnas has racked up over a million Instagram followers by sharing daily outfit selfies, lukewarm TikTok dance routines, and snapshots of her well-dressed daughters cuddling on expensive sofas in her various homes. In April, she became the poster woman for inequality during coronavirus when she pulled strings to get tested for the virus and then broke federal guidelines by traveling to a Hamptons rental with her family.

While some speculated that the episode would ruin her career, Charnas emerged intact after a few tearful apologies and fans forgave, commenting effusively on photos of the private beachfront to which she’d inadvisably traveled.

But on May 25, Southhampton florist Mark Masone went public with accusations that Charnas failed to pay for several Mother’s Day bouquets she’d ordered from his store. In a now-deleted instagram post, he said that several weeks after delivery, the influencer alleged they’d never arrived and cancelled her payment. Masone was adamant that he had in fact fulfilled the orders.

Another AC scandal happening over on Instagram… (her comment’s now deleted, btw)

Charnas was exploiting a small business during the worst economic climate for small businesses in recent history, Masone said. “I work hard for my money and I have a family to feed. I don’t work for free and I am sure Ariel [sic] doesn’t either,” he wrote, adding that “this is disgusting behavior to do [sic] to a business and especially during a pandemic.”

After Charnas commented on the Instagram post, chalking up the nonpayment to a “miscommunication” with her team and offering to speak by phone, a friend of the florist’s quickly clapped back. Monique Wisniewski had been helping Masone fulfill Mother’s Day orders and said she’d personally discussed order delivery dates with Charnas “Actually, you spoke with me…directly,” Wisniewski wrote, calling her “another entitled influencer.”

Charnas’s Instagram presence implies (when it doesn’t explicitly advertise) a lifestyle of lavish and casual expenditure, so it’s a little surprising to see her quibbling over a few flowers — but as Wisniewski pointed out, in the context of influencer culture it shouldn’t be. Personalities with large followings often receive free products and services in exchange for posting about them, an arrangement that allows influencers to cultivate a glamorous, follow-worthy aesthetic even as many aren’t actually that wealthy. It’s all too easy for influencers to feel that their patronage is payment enough. But in this case, Masone didn’t even get a sponsored post in return.

A post shared by Arielle Charnas (@ariellecharnas) on May 13, 2020 at 9:20am PDT

On the other hand, Charnas’ wealth seems to have preceded her social media fame. Her husband, successful real estate developer Brandon Charnas, has been labelled one of “the internet’s most successful Instagram husbands,” by InStyle, and Charnas was posting about her designer footwear long before she became the face of a fashion line.

Maybe Charnas was feeling the financial pressure of both maintaining an indefinitely quarantine pad and splashing out for Mother’s Day. Maybe she has the money and really doesn’t know or care how the other half lives. Either way, the episode is a reminder of a reality that’s become especially clear since the pandemic’s onset: the lives of influencers are never really what they seem.

Irene Katz Connelly is an editorial fellow at the Forward. You can contact her at connelly@forward.com.

After Trojan’s horny bread cookbook, babka will never look the same

First your frenemies started posting their perfect loaves of sourdough bread on Instagram. Then shortages of flour and yeast became so severe that people started arguing about who has the right to make their own bread and who deserves supermarket offal. Now, condom manufacturer Trojan has published an e-cookbook of phallus-shaped bread recipes for bakers with “big babka energy.”

No, this does not at all sound logical to The Schmooze either. But it is March 276th, and this is where we are now.

Titled “Rising Time,” the 69-page spread (yes, there really are sixty-nine pages) is like one big winky-face joke made by that one guy in your friend group who responds to every text with the eggplant emoji. All the recipes are titled with unintelligible but identifiably dirty puns: you can make a white bread known as “Sliced Missionary,” a pumpernickel loaf named “Pump Her Nickel” (what exactly is the nickel in this scenario?) or (lest you think things were getting too subtle) garlic knots called “Knot Without a Condom.”

Rest assured, the favored pastries of the Jewish people have not been forgotten. The cookbook features a poppy seed challah aptly titled “Make Her Challah.” And on Instagram, Trojan teased the project with a snapshot of a glossy babka slightly too big to fit the frame (it’s well-endowed, get it?) wrapped in a taut plastic bag (we trust you don’t need the metaphor explained).

Each recipe is paired with a Trojan product with which bakers are apparently supposed to amuse themselves while the dough rises. As in, “The dough is going to rise for about 1 ½ to 2 hours. Put a Magnum Ribbed on your big babka and get to lovemaking.” Or, for challah, “Your sexual bulk can double while you please your lover with a Trojan Her Pleasure Ecstasy condom. Your bedroom will get HOT as you and lover braid your legs sexually.”

If it was not written by a prolific middle school fanfiction article with a thing for carbs, “Rising Time” was probably penned by people (and by people, I mean men) who do not understand what an effortful process bread-making is. Braid legs with my lover sexually while the loaf rises? The only activities in which I’m interested after wrestling dough into an Instagrammable shape are removing scraps from my hair and person, eating Milanos, and napping.

TLDR, Trojan is worried that you’re too distracted by the global pandemic unfolding around you to bone your partner, and they’re here to help you do so (safely). You can download this horny little flour-fest here. Make sure to store in a file labeled “NOT PORN.” It’s free, but unfortunately no Magnum condoms are included.

Irene Katz Connelly is an editorial fellow at the Forward. You can contact her at connelly@forward.com.

Has celebrity chef Alison Roman been cancelled for good?

Several lengthy apologies later, it looked like the feud between celebrity chef Alison Roman and model-cum-lifestyle-guru Chrissy Teigen was over — until The New York Times stepped in.

The newspaper has placed Roman’s bi-weekly column “on temporary leave,” a spokesperson told the Daily Beast on Tuesday, after disparaging comments Roman made about two Asian celebrities in a May 7 interview.

Speaking to The New Consumer, Roman characterized both Teigen and organization guru Marie Kondo as sell-outs for launching homeware lines. Critics soon pointed out that Roman teased her own brand partnership in the same interview. Moreover, in a world where so many celebrities monetize their image, she had singled out the work of two women of color for criticism. In the past, Roman has been criticized for adapting recipes from non-European cuisines without acknowledging their origins.

While Roman initially tried to dismiss what she described as “baby’s first Internet backlash,” she eventually posted a long apology to Instagram, saying of Teigen and Kondo that “they both worked extremely hard to get where they are and both deserve better than my tone-deaf remarks.” She continued that, “I’m a white woman who has and will continue to benefit from white privilege and I recognize that makes what I said even more inexcusable and hurtful. The fact that it didn’t even occur to me that I had singled out two Asian women is one hundred percent a function of my privilege.”

A post shared by Alison Roman (@alisoneroman) on May 11, 2020 at 4:51pm PDT

Teigen thanked her for the apology on Twitter, saying the flap reminded her of her own trajectory as a celebrity. “I remember the exact time I realized I wasn’t allowed to say whatever popped in my head — that I couldn’t just say things in the way that so many of my friends were saying,” Teigen tweeted.

thank u for this, @alisoneroman. To be clear, it never once crossed my mind for u to apologize for what you genuinely thought! The comments stung, but they moreso stung because they came from u! It wasn’t my usual news break of some random person hating everything about me!— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) May 12, 2020

After the Daily Beast reported the suspension of Roman’s column, Teigen took to Twitter again. Explicitly extending goodwill, she commented approvingly on a photo of the chef’s shallot pasta posted by journalist Olivia Nuzzi. When another fan asked if “the beef” had ended, Teigen replied, “I hope we can laugh about it one day but I’m not happy with the NYT leave.”

I hope we can laugh about it one day but I’m not happy with the NYT leave so she def can’t laugh about it yet. It just sucks in every way.— chrissy teigen (@chrissyteigen) May 20, 2020

“It just sucks in every way,” she added.

Irene Katz Connelly is an editorial fellow at the Forward. You can contact her at connelly@forward.com.